Nearby Attractions
The University has one of the best
music schools
in the USA and an excellent school of art
housed in one of the strangest university buildings ever. So, there will probably be a number of enjoyable things to do
and see on the campus if you are in need of a break. Across the
street is a pleasant park called
Burnet Woods
where you can have a nice walk. About four blocks away is the world
famous
Cincinnati Zoo.
About 3 Km away is Main Street which hosts most of the interesting
yuppie nightlife (some nice micro-breweries are there as well) and
about 4 Km away is
Mount Adams
which hosts the rest (and has nice views). The
Art Museum
is also about 4 Km away. Two charming parks,
Ault Park and
Eden Park,
are nearby; both are worth a visit if plants make you smile. Near
Ault Park you can find the
University Observatory
which still opens its doors to the general public. Forget about using the
Cincinnati Subway
- although a tunnel was built almost 100 years ago, no one ever bothered
to lay the track or buy the rolling stock. There is (inexpensive)
city bus service
to downtown and to the northern suburbs, where most of the upscale
shopping is, but the bus is slow and relatively infrequent.
Possibly Interesting Facts About the University
- Joseph Strauss, an 1892 Civil Engineering graduate of UC,
designed and built the Golden Gate Bridge (why did you think the
bridge is painted red?). A brick from the old McMicken Hall is
cemented into the base of the south anchorage.
- Chris Wanstrath, former CEO and co-founder of GitHub, attended UC
from 2003 to 2005 as an English major.
- Donald Shell discovered the Shell Sort algorithm while working
on a Masters degree in the Mathematics Department.
- Vinod Dham, chief architect of the Pentium Chip, is a graduate
of Electrical Engineering at UC.
- Frank B. Brady, one of the pioneers of ILS before and during
WWII and director of the introduction of ILS systems into North
Atlantic routes and the European theatre of operations, studied
radio and electrical engineering at UC from 1933 to 1939, working
also at Crosley Radio.
- Arnold Spielberg, father of Steven Spielberg and grandfather of
E.T., graduated from the old Department of Electrical Engineering in
1949. In 1953 he designed the first computerized point-of-sale
system in the world for RCA. His system was tested at Higbees
department store in Cleveland. Later he fathered GE's series 200
computers. Spielberg and Brady knew each other when Spielberg
co-oped at Crosley.
- Michael J. Fister, holder of Bachelor's (1977) and Master's
(1978) degrees in Electrical Engineering from UC, has served as Vice
President at Intel and President and CEO of Cadence Design Systems,
Inc.
- James Kaiser, co-pioneer of Digital Signal Processing, graduated
from UC in 1952 as an Electrical Engineer.
- Brad Kuhn, a graduate of the old Department of Electrical and
Computer Engineering and Computer Science, was director of the Free
Software Foundation and is now the Free/Libre/Open-Source Software
(FLOSS) community liaison, Technology Director of the Software
Freedom Law Center (SFLC), and president of the Software Freedom
Conservancy. In short, he is known as a free software activist.
- Ken Seidelmann, Director of Astrometry at the US Naval
Observatory, co-discoverer of the Saturn satellite
Calypso, and member of the Wide Field/Planetary Camera Team
of the Hubble Space Telescope, graduated from UC with E.E., M.S.,
and Ph.D. degrees. The minor planet 3217 is named after him.
- John H. Hall, pioneer of low-power CMOS integrated circuit
technology, and developer of Tungsten Gate Merged BiCMOS technology,
graduated from UC in 1961. He is credited with saving the Minuteman
project by solving a circuit problem that made the missles explode
unexpectedly while flying through clouds.
- Sebastian Mauchly, father of ENIAC inventor John Mauchly,
graduated with a doctorate from the University of Cincinnati.
- Albert Sabin developed the oral polio vaccine while on the
faculty at UC
- George Rieveschl Jr. discovered the first commercial
antihistamine agent, known as Benadryl, while on the faculty at UC.
He also held Undergraduate, Masters, and Ph.D. degrees from
UC.
- Brian Rose, formerly a faculty member in the Classics Department,
is in charge of Troy excavations. Carl Blegen of UC established
modern scientific methods in archaeology during his excavations of
the Troy site which lasted six years beginning in 1932.
- Neil Armstrong, first man on the Moon, was a member of the
Aerospace Engineering faculty at UC from 1971 to 1979.
- William Howard Taft, the only US President to serve as Chief
Justice of the United States, graduated from the UC Law School and
served as its Dean.
- Sports greats Sandy Koufax and Oscar Robinson played for UC as
students. Koufax came to UC on a basketball scholarship.
- Herman Schneider started cooperative education in the United
States, as Dean of the College of Engineering, in 1906. To this day
the College of Engineering requires all its graduates to have co-op
training.
- Heather French, a former student of Design, Art, Architecture, and
Planning, is Miss America for the year 2000 and Kristen Haglund became Miss
America for 2008 while a student at UC's College-Conservatory for
Music.
- The work of Cleveland Abbe, former director of the Cincinnati
Observatory, led to the creation of the National Weather
Service.
- Kathleen Battle earned Undergraduate and Masters degrees from
UC's Cincinnati Conservatory of Music in the early 1970s. Later,
she was granted an honorary Doctorate as well.
- Thomas
Berger, author of Little Big Man, Crazy in Berlin and
the "Rhinehart" Trilogy, graduated from the College of Arts
and Sciences in 1948.
- Miller Huggins, feared manager of the New York Yankees, started
out with a Law Degree from UC in 1902.
- Jerry Rubin, the anti-war protestor of the 1960's, graduated
from UC in 1961 before briefly attending UC, Berkeley.
- More improbable Cincinnatians to follow.
